Online Wedding Planning Guide

Ask yourself why you are having a wedding at all.

Why not go down to the courthouse and get married in front of a judge tomorrow afternoon (or as soon as you can get a license)?

I’m serious. Think about that question carefully. Your answer to this question reveals a lot about what’s important to you in your wedding planning.

Once you get consumed by the planning process and “I am planning the perfect wedding, and I’ll do whatever it takes” becomes your daily mantra, you lose grips with the real reason why you’re getting married, and forget that you’re about to embark on one of the greatest adventures in life: marriage and starting your own family. – Mika

If the first thing that pops into your head as a response is, “Oh, no, I can’t elope. I’ve always pictured myself in the white dress with the veil and gloves, holding flowers,” then you know that achieving those elements in your wedding is important to you.

If your response is, “I can’t elope. I really want to share this experience with the people I love,” then you’ll know that you should spend money on your guest list (in terms of affording food and space for all your guests) as you plan your wedding.

Prioritize what you think is important so you know where you can compromise (and you will have to). – Angela

On the other hand, if your response is, “I can’t elope. My mother would kill me” then maybe you should let your mother plan your wedding.

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Did that suggestion just give you the chills? Even if it didn’t, you should really try to get an image of what you want from your wedding, or don’t bother having one.

Think about the courthouse thing again. Really get the image in your head. Today you’re engaged. Tomorrow you and your man go to the courthouse and come out married. You’re married forever. That’s the end.

How do you feel about that? What doesn’t feel right to you? What elements of that image make you feel disappointed? Are you saying, “But I won’t have any wedding photos to show my children” or what?

We wanted things and details to be appropriate for us, not everyone else in our families who seemed to have very different needs and expectations of what our wedding should be like. — Coleen

Identify those elements of a wedding that it would really break your heart to live without.

Ask yourself: "Why do I need a wedding in addition to a marriage?"

"If I couldn’t have a wedding, what would I miss most?"

"What does that suggest is most important to me in my wedding?"

"What area of my wedding does that suggest I should spend the most money/effort on?"

Copy that list a few times and post it in strategic places around your home. By your phone and taped to your fiancé’s head are a couple particularly good posting spots because those are likely things for you to be looking at when the wedding frustration rises too high, and you have to remind yourself why you started this extravaganza in the first place.

Just as an aside, if thinking about the courthouse wedding raises no negative feelings in you whatsoever, maybe you should consider it. There’s nothing wrong with getting married the cheap and easy way. You can always throw a party or an anniversary “wedding” celebration some time in the future when your circumstances warrant it and your heart desires it.

This is your wedding. Now that you know what you want, you can go out and get it.

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Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters //